I honestly don’t know why her 17 month photo turned out so blurry. But she is smiling and sitting still and has a headband to die for, so I left it. But this 18 month photo… man she grew.

I made the decision after agonizing over it and asking for advice on my Facebook page, to try out my own family practice doctor for Olivia’s 18 month check. Every time I brought Olivia to the doctor, she ended up sick. And my anxiety sucks in the pediatric waiting room trying to keep Olivia away from the toys and other kids. I love her pediatrician, but I just want to see how it works going to my smaller, quieter clinic. So we’ll see. Her appointment is next Tuesday.

Summer weather is finally here! Kind of. This is Minnesota, so the past two days have been cold and rainy and prior to that, hot. So no romper or dress for her 18 month photo. Boo. Still, Minnie is a good substitute.

We celebrated Easter and Mother’s Day and went down to Iowa to visit Chris’s parents last month. Olivia is quite the outdoor girl. This month has brought us some more sickness and teething, but overall, she’s loving life and babbling like crazy.

Nicknames: Ollie, Bug, Bugsly, Olls, Monkey

Weight: 23 plus some- she REFUSED to sit still on the scale so this was the best we got.Length: 32 inchesDiaper size: 4Shoe size/Clothing Size: 4/ Wearing 18 month and 2T clothing, can still fit in some 12 month sizesTeeth: 11 (6 up and 5 down) Still waiting on her last one year molar.

Eating: She continues to nurse about 5 times a day, and I am going through my stash of frozen milk. Lately, she’s been nursing a lot more than that, and I’m thinking it’s her 18 month growth spurt, because I feel like I have a newborn again. She still isn’t the greatest at drinking enough water during the day, so I’m not sure how I will cut out nursing sessions, since she gets her fluids almost solely from nursing. She went through a stage of being sort of a picky eater, but I think it’s improving. She continues to not be the biggest fan of vegetables, but is willing to eat more meat now. She will eat fish (OK, OK in the form of mostly fish sticks), but also loves shrimp, ground hamburger, and chicken. Her favorites continue to be blueberries, berries in general, cheese, yogurt, Veggie Straws, and Mexican. She also recently tried cherries and loved them. She has been loving dried mango and raisons, but I do get concerned with cavities. She will see the dentist again in June.

Sleeping: While she was teething, back around 17 months, her sleep has definitely been affected by her molars. When I didn’t give her Motrin, she had a hard time sleeping. Some nights, I tried to forgo it, and she would inevitably be up around midnight, so I ended up giving it to her. But once her teething slowed down, she went back to sleeping really well. In fact, she will go down around 7:30 and sleeps until about 7 a.m. It’s been just a few nights where she was up in the early morning, between 4 and 5 a.m. nursing and then would go back to sleep. She’s been on mostly 1 nap a day, where I put her down around 1:00 and she usually sleeps about 1.5 hours. I’m hoping she will stretch it to 2 hours, since it’s my only real time during the day to get things done. Since we’re still in the transition phase, some days, she will take a morning nap as well, and then will go down again about 3:00.

Milestones: She is a pro at using her fork to stab things and is really proud of herself when she does. She has mastered sipping soup with her spoon, which I’m impressed by, being that I felt clueless about teaching her how to use utensils back when she was littler. She loves walking long distances backwards, much to my dismay because she hasn’t learned the fine art of actually looking where she’s going. She now goes up and down the stairs like a champ and I really don’t have to be right there helping her anymore. She loves coloring with crayons. She will “run” places and has kind of gotten the idea of kicking a ball. She is climbing on the couch by herself and even on the dining room chairs to sit at the table. I know she is going to fall onto her head one of these days. And this week she opened up our bedroom door by herself. And we have door handles that don’t have the ability to take child-proofing. Yay.

Communication: She’s actually saying things now besides Mama and Dada. She will say “WOW!” when she’s eating something yummy (she got that from me) or sees something amazing like a bird outside the window. She says “What’s that?” in Olivia speak (whas sat?), and “All done,” again, in Olivia speak (ah da!). She’s using her one sign I taught her, “please,” on her own when she wants something. Her sign for thank you is a hand over her mouth, like she’s blowing a kiss. Speaking of which, she is finally “blowing kisses” to people. She consistently claps her hands together when she’s done with her meal. She points and gently tugs at my shirt when she wants to nurse. I got her to say, “Uh oh” one time when she dropped something. Otherwise, she has been very into pointing at things, all sorts of things, and loves when I tell her what they are. Especially the back covers of books: barcodes, logos, publishing companies. She can’t get enough of them.

She’s also very good at telling me when I’ve caused her dissatisfaction. Which is 75% of the day.

Activities: Besides for her ECFE class, that will end in May, she has been doing Story Time at the library, but we switched that out for Tot Time at the community center in April until they broke for summer. It will definitely be on our list for next fall and winter, because it’s basically a huge gym full of balls, stacking paraphernalia, tents, slides and things to ride, like the Cozy Coupes (which she’s all about, by the way). At only $3 a session, it’s not bad. We also hit up Gander Mountain a few times which was a huge hit. She loved the aquarium and all the animals.

Otherwise, walking around Target, Kohl’s, Toys R Us, and the mall are excellent time-wasters. Now that is actually feels like summer however, we tend to spend a lot of time outside. In the back yard, on walks or at the parks.

In fact, the weather has been just gorgeous and I’ve been following her around with my camera out in the backyard.

Health: She was teething up a storm at about 15 months and three molars broke through, along with one of her lower front teeth. For awhile, it was Motrin almost every night for a few weeks. Luckily, we caught some breaks so I didn’t kill off her liver. She also got a cold at the beginning of April, caught from me. It was just a low grade fever and runny nose with some coughing and didn’t progress beyond that. I really attribute its short duration (and her past shortened illnesses) with breastfeeding and the fact that I am on the Juice Plus.

Last week, after three days of another cold/off and on fever, I came down with her sickness last Tuesday night. I took a dose of Nyquil, something I haven’t taken since before I was pregnant, expecting to go to bed early and hopefully feel better the next day. I went to bed at 9:30 feeling like total exhaustion. At 10:00, Olivia woke up vomiting. Did I mention we had spaghetti with meat sauce for dinner? Yeah. It was pretty much as awful as it sounds. She threw up 7 more times until she finally fell asleep in Chris’ arms at 11:30. We got some Gatorade in her before we put her to bed at 12:30 and then she was out until 3 when Chris got up with her to give her some sips of Gatorade. She slept until 7 and I started nursing her again after the OK from the triage nurse. It’s been slow going, with waning diarrhea and a continued runny nose, but we’re in the clear now.

Likes: She looooves going down slides, watching other kids, playing in the dirt.

She is great at pointing out body parts as you ask her. Her favorite is bellybuttons. Yours, mine, hers. She knows no boundaries. She also loves when we go through the photos on the walls, naming who each person is in the picture. Her and Toby are really starting to hit off a life-long friendship.

She also has been really into coloring.

Dislikes: She continues to squawk at getting her face wiped, but now it’s been angry shouting for every. single. diaper change. Most of the time, by the time she’s tackled and lying down, she is ok, especially if she has a toy to distract her, but every time we do diaper changes now, she runs away, goes limp when she is picked up and fusses when she laid down. Obviously a stage. Still irritating.

It’s also a 50/50 getting her into the car seat. Sometimes she shrieks and tries to claw her way out. Again, irritating. However, she has stopped hating her books and being read to, so that’s good.

Looking forward to: Summer! Not the humidity, bugs and sweating. But the warmth. The ability to walk the 20 minutes to the library in the morning for Story Time. Playing in her new pool I got her. It’s big enough for me to join her, because I’m not about to sit outside of it and sweat while she has all the fun.

I so feel like from 17-18 months Bowen went from still kind of a baby to full on kid ya know? So sad 🙁 I think we are having some teething issues at the moment also. Props to Olivia for mastering the stairs! Bowen can get up them but insist on walking down them which he can’t do. It’s funny how the words they start saying are the same. Bowen said his version of thank you several times one evening and then never again since. I keep waiting for more but not sure how fast this is going to happen.… Read more »

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Hey there! I’m Risa, author of this website. I’m an RN turned freelance writer and personal blogger passionately writing about motherhood, infertility, and health. You can email me with any questions at risakerslakewrites@gmail.com.

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